NuScale (SMR) Stock: Why It Fell 7% on a Barclays Downgrade

Oct 20, 2026: Barclays cuts to Underweight and the stock hits a new low

Premarket trading opened at $5.65 at 4am and drifted to about $5.58 by 5:55am. In the five minutes after 6am the stock dropped to $5.34 as the downgrade spread; Investing.com reported it down 6.5% in pre-open trading at 6:54am. It kept sliding to a low of $5.18 just after 8:05am, then steadied. At 8:50am it was $5.27, down 7.4%, with the regular session still to open at 9:30am.

What pushed it down:

• Barclays moved to Underweight. The firm cut its rating from Equal Weight and its target to $5 from $11, Investing.com, Stocktwits and GuruFocus reported. Stocktwits, citing The Fly, said Barclays pointed to delays in commercial milestones and uncertainty around the proposed TVA deployment. The analyst was not named in the reports we read.
• The TVA deal is still unsigned. TVA and ENTRA1 announced an agreement in September 2025 to develop up to 6 gigawatts of new nuclear power through six plants using NuScale reactors, Power Engineering reported. NuScale said in August that ENTRA1 "continues to advance discussions" with TVA toward a definitive agreement. Barclays now sees a risk those talks run into 2027.
• The new target sits below the price. The $5 target is about 12% below the Oct 19 close and is now the lowest on the stock. The consensus target is $10.50, with a high of $16.
• No company news. SEC EDGAR shows no NuScale filing since an insider Form 4 on Oct 5, and we found no company release on Oct 20. Investing.com also noted that a law firm has opened an investigation on behalf of shareholders.

How the group traded before the open, from the Oct 19 close:

The whole group was soft, which accounts for some of the drop. The other half is NuScale's own: it fell about twice as far as the next weakest name, and it was the only one with a rating change. For other stocks on the move, see today's biggest stock moves.

Going into the session, RSI(14) stood at 28, the shares sat 34% below their 50-day average and 50% below their 200-day average, Monday's volume ran 0.5 times its 20-day average of 33.3 million shares, and the stock was 88% below its 52-week high of $46.40.

Two sell ratings in six weeks

Barclays is the second broker to turn negative since September. On Sep 11 UBS cut the stock to Sell from Neutral with a $6 target, citing a construction timeline it puts at more than five years, no firm customer commitments and about $700 million of cumulative cash burn over three years, 24/7 Wall St. reported. Investing.com reported UBS also pointed to an "erosion of NuScale's first-mover advantage." The stock closed down 15.7% that day, at $8.61.

Not everyone has given up. B. Riley and Canaccord Genuity kept Buy ratings in August while cutting their targets to $15, MarketBeat reported, and RBC rates it Sector Perform. Stocktwits counted 9 of 18 analysts at Hold and 6 at Buy or Strong Buy. A downgrade is a soft catalyst: it changes opinion, not the business. What makes this one hurt is that it names the one hard catalyst investors have been waiting for and pushes it out.

The numbers

NuScale's second quarter, reported Aug 5, showed how little revenue the business earns while it waits for orders.

Revenue fell because engineering work for the RoPower project in Romania finished in late 2025, the company said. Research and administrative costs both rose. The cash pile came largely from $984.5 million of net equity raised in the first half, 24/7 Wall St. reported, which is why the share count rose 29% in six months. Our explainer on dilution and share count changes covers why that matters for each share's claim on the cash.

At $5.27, the 410.4 million shares counted at June 30 are worth about $2.16 billion, a little above the $1.9 billion of cash and investments. The price-to-book ratio is 1.05. That is the bull argument in one line: the market is paying little for the reactor business itself. The catch is that the cash is being spent, and the company can issue more stock under the $750 million program at any time. For how to frame that, see how to estimate cash runway and our guide to enterprise value.

The case for the stock

• A cash floor. The balance sheet carries no debt, and cash and investments cover most of the market value.
• The only certified design. NuScale holds the only U.S. NRC small modular reactor design certification, 24/7 Wall St. noted, an advantage that took years to earn.
• A crowded short. Short sellers held 18.9% of the float. Any signed contract could force fast buying; our page on short interest and squeeze risk explains the mechanics.
• Targets well above the price. The $10.50 consensus target is roughly double the premarket price, though it is falling.

The risks

• No binding order. Without a signed power purchase agreement, NuScale has no large contract to turn into revenue, and Barclays now expects the TVA talks to take longer.
• More dilution. Sales under the $750 million program would add shares at today's lower prices.
• Cash burn. UBS expects about $700 million of cumulative burn over three years, more than a third of the cash on hand.
• Peer pressure. Nuclear names have fallen together on several days this autumn, and Oklo was also down in premarket trading. The group has not found a floor.

What comes next

1. Third-quarter results, with a call at 5:00pm ET on November 5. Analysts expect a loss of about $0.12 a share. Watch the share count, any sales under the share program, the cash balance and any TVA language. Our guide to preparing for an earnings report covers what to read first.
2. A TVA decision. A signed definitive agreement between ENTRA1 and TVA would be the single largest change to the outlook.
3. RoPower in Romania. NuScale, Nuclearelectrica and RoPower Nuclear are working to meet the conditions of the shareholder vote that advanced the six-module Doicești project.
4. Further rating changes. With the lowest target now at $5, another cut below the price would extend the pattern; an upgrade would be the first sign it is breaking.